


success comes in pairs

by ravels (orphan_account)



Category: Phandom/The Fantastic Foursome (YouTube RPF)
Genre: M/M, Non-Graphic Smut, Retrospective, Skype, and kind of a new years fic, basically all about the significance of them being a pair, just commemorating all the things they've done
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-29
Updated: 2016-12-29
Packaged: 2018-09-13 06:29:59
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,140
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9110659
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/ravels
Summary: dan howell and phil lester have been a joint entity for so long that theandin between has simply become a part of their names. over the years, they’ve slowly become one, since even before it had transcended into a brand, before the sold-out shows, before there were fans watching their every move. they come as a pair, a package deal, and always have.





	

**Author's Note:**

> warnings for brief mentions of sex!  
> also i wrote this entire thing in the car so apologies if it seems rushed at all, the tenses may or may not be different throughout the fic and the formatting may be a little off.

_And._

It’s funny, the impact that a single word can have on a relationship. The word 'and' carries a good deal of power with it, traditionally. It implies coordination, transforming two individuals into a joint unit with a mere breath and a flick of the tongue.

Dan and Phil have been a joint entity for so long that the _and_ in between has simply become a part of their names. Over the years, they’ve slowly become one, since even before it had transcended into a brand, before the sold-out shows, before there were fans watching their every move. They come as a pair, a package deal, and always have.

To trace the history of this would be almost impossible, but Dan's faintest memory of it lies in the familiarity of a gritty Skype call across hundreds of kilometers of land, his chin buried into a pillow and Phil's face at the bottom corner of his screen, gleaming through the darkness of his bedroom.

In this memory, they fall into comfortable silence after a long, winding conversation about Phil's roommates. Dan’s head rests on the cushy flesh of his forearm, watching Phil with a distant, vague smile on his face.

"Dan and Phil," Phil murmurs, suddenly, and then he had repeats it, a question this time, testing out how the words feel on his tongue.\

Dan looks up, in his eyes a responding question. "What do you think, Dan?" Phil asks him, softly. His eyes are gleaming, clear and blue. "Dan and Phil: lords of the Internet, partners in crime, the dynamic double act, bedazzling stages across the nation—"

And Dan of 2009's September laughs, because of course not. He’s a nobody, no one special, just a lonely guy from Wokingham with no foreseeable future and a _fuckload_ of good luck. There’s no "lord of the Internet" in his future, no bedazzling stage acts for him. For Phil, maybe. Not him.

He snatches the pillow that he had been clinging onto and flings it playfully at the webcam, grinning when Phil feigned hurt. They haven’t yet met in person, but this is just about as good as it gets.

(A few months later, _phil is not on fire_ serves as a loud and proud announcement to everyone that was listening that yes, it’s Dan _and_ Phil now, and that that _and_ is not going away anytime soon.)

&

When they move into that apartment in London, Dan wipes the sweat from his brow and shoots Phil a look of " _can you believe this?_ " Phil nods, smiling as he sets down a box.

(And later that evening they have sex on what’ll be their bedroom floor, warm and languid and soft, because they've come so far and because, well, their bed hasn't quite been assembled yet.)

Success comes in pairs.

&

“ _It’s Dan and Phil on BBC Radio 1!_ ” The cool voice of the radio's announcer proclaims, every Sunday night, week after week. And yet, inevitably, for a while, their desire to be known as separate people makes the _and_ an enemy of theirs.

Though they’ll still kiss, and will still have sex, to the public eye they’re now danisnotonfire _with_ amazingphil, and somehow _with_ isn't quite the same. (Also, the alternative option is _or_ , and Dan _or_ Phil just doesn't make any sense in the context, however appropriate it might be.)

They don’t fight. They don’t slam doors or yell at each other. They just... fall apart a little.

Dan wants his independent creative integrity to be respected. Okay, Phil tells him, and leaves Dan to do things in his life while he did things in his own.

(They always fall back in sync in the end, though. Two magnets can only travel so far apart before smashing together again.)

&

Dan lifts a vlogging camera in front of them on 2014’s Christmas Eve.

They sit there on the floor next to their all-lit-up Christmas tree, clad in jumpers and skinny jeans, ready to document the story of their story, the first instalment of their making-of series for their upcoming book.

“Should we say the title together, or is that cheesy?” Phil asks, unsure. The camera is rolling, blinking its red light at them.

“No, no, it’s fine,” Dan replies.

And then they say it.

“Because it’s, you know, both of our usernames and it has the word ‘book’ in it—”

It also has the word ‘ _and_ ’ in it, of course. When talking about Dan and Phil, you really can't get too far without it.

&

A few months later, their book publishers give them a light-up ampersand as a gift.

“We were going to give you a D and a P as a gift, but then we realized that if we just gave you this ampersand we could encompass ‘Dan and Phil’ with just one symbol,” Mark explains.

Dan catches Phil’s eye knowingly before replying, “What a lovely gift! I’ve never seen this kind of idea before.”

The ampersand gets placed in their lounge, atop their bookshelf full of pictures of them and of all the mementos that have carried them through the years.

&

In 2016, it really needn't be said anymore that they’re a package deal, and yet somehow they still have to. Awards shows usually recognize them as being a pair, so that, when they arrive clad in matching outfits and identical grins, it normally isn't that much of a surprise.

For the Teen Awards, for which they don their matching bomber jackets, they receive an award for ‘Best Vlogger,’ even though they’re the only duo in the running.

At the BONCAS, they sweep the awards cabinet together, taking home an award for their tour documentary and for one of the _phil is not on fire_ s. Phil also wins Best Creator, and he stands on stage in his muted gold suit jacket and says, loud and proud and clear, “I’ve spent the majority of 2016 with another person, Dan Howell, so I think it’s only fair that he comes up here as well.” And Dan rises to his feet in the audience, grinning ear-to-ear in incredulity, and steps up to the stage, ready to accept that yes, they _are_ one and the same.

(“We’ll saw it in half,” Phil jests. But when have Dan and Phil ever been particularly proficient with hardware?)

The British Online Creator Award was shaped like a hashtag, but it really might as well have been an ampersand.

&

On a cold, lazy day in late December, their fingers rest, laced, on the soft, dark upholstery of their sofa armrests. They’ve both settled to edit their respective main channel videos one-handedly for the day.

(The Dan and Phil household has developed a careful synchronicity since that gritty Skype call in 2009, sustained by the knowledge that, wherever one of them goes, the other can't be far behind.)

_fin_

**Author's Note:**

> also posted on tumblr: [x](http://ohmemories.co.vu/post/155135267666/success-comes-in-pairs)


End file.
